Q&A with Brian Richardson

On the road from Bologna, Italy to the city of Reggio Emilia, there is a scattering of brand name manufacturing centers–Ferrari, Maserati, Ducati–along the freeway. It’s small industrial cluster in north eastern Italy. The Brevini brothers, Renato, Luciano, and Corrado, founded Fratelli Brevini to produce agricultural machinery in 1960. Over time, the company developed an expertise with planetary gear units and more sophisticated drive systems. Since then, the Brevini Group has grown into one of the leading manufacturers of planetary and helical gears worldwide and continues to maintain its headquarters in the northeastern Italian city of Reggio Emilia.

The Brevini Group is a multi-faceted organization. How does it break down?

There are three main business units within the Brevini Group: Brevini Power Transmission, Brevini Fluid Power, and Brevini Gear, all 100% owned by the Brevini family through Brevini Group, an international holding company.

Brevini Power Transmission (BPT), the main company that the Brevini brothers started so many years ago, is headquartered in Italy and focuses on planetary gearboxes. It is one of the European leaders in power transmission design and manufacturing.

A subsidiary of BPT, PIV Drives is located near Frankfort, Germany and supplies parallel-shaft heavy duty drive solutions. Brevini Power Transmission has its focus on planetary gearboxes, whereas PIV focuses on parallel and right angle shaft gearboxes as well as mechanical speed variators.

Within the United States there are two Brevini business units:

Brevini USA, a sales, service, and distribution center for BPT, covers the entire United States through a network of sales engineers and an extensive network of both fluid power and power transmission distributors.

Brevini Gear, the latest business unit development of the Brevini Group, is making the transition to the open gearing market from the wind market.

As you move into the gear market, The Brevini Group has continued to support you, allowing for retention of core people along with their knowledge and expertise on how to run these large, complex pieces of equipment. What kind of advantages does this afford you?

Our talent is self-propelling, so to speak, coming from the wind industry. Our facility was set up to manufacture and heat treat large-diameter, high-precision gearing and assemble that gearing into large wind turbine gearboxes–testing each one to full power before shipping. To do that, we have state-of-the-art equipment for gear shaping, grinding, heat treatment, as well as measurement and inspection, so it’s natural that our forte is large, high-precision gear sets. Likewise, we have one of the largest test stands in the U.S. rated at over 6 megawatts. We definitely have the capability of testing large gearboxes. We are committed to being a participant in this industry with the on-going support from our parent company.

What are your feelings on the transition into open gearing?

The gear market is different. It’s much more fragmented than the wind industry where just a few global companies dominate the industry and have most of the market share. There are a very large number of companies in the gear industry and many have developed a strong brand around a specific market segment like aerospace or industrial gear sets. Likewise, the international market for large, industrial gear units involves a vast range of highly diversified applications that is constantly expanding. It’s challenging to say the least.

That said, our philosophy in the open gearing market is the same as Brevini’s other markets, inspired by three simple ideas: reliable and innovative products, outstanding quality, and superb technical support. These basic philosophies tie back strongly to products produced by Brevini since 1960. In line with those tenants, Brevini Gear is earning the trust and respect of customers with outstanding performance and quality–the gear market makes you earn that trust and respect every day. Other companies in the gear industry have developed a strong brand around aerospace and industrial gear sets based on their quality and performance, and we want to do the same. The Brevini brand is well known for our planetary gear sets and complex drive systems in Europe. That’s Brevini Gear’s brand promise in the U.S. as well. We’re exploring options with petroleum, mining, and other end user industries where our large, high precision products will match up well with the industry and customer requirements.

Brevini Gear’s main manufacturing plant is 130,000 sq. ft. It is centrally located in Yorktown, Indiana. We are a member of AGMA and will be ISO 9001:2008 certified as of January 1, 2014. The facility opened for business in 2010.

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